The present invention relates to a method for discriminating the production background of products by a bar code system. More specifically, the present invention relates to a method for discriminating the production background of products by a bar code system (related to Korean Patent Application No. 2000-12346), in which the production background of the products to be procured can be known quickly and easily by an ES code (environmental protection and safety code) marked on the products for the sake of the convenience of consumers.
Generally, the bar codes are marked on every product, and these bar codes are for the convenience of the product makers and distributors, the bar codes containing commodity name, commodity serial number, price and the like. Thus the bar codes have no relation to consumers, and therefore, consumers buy the commodities based only on the general information which are specified by the producers or the distributors.
A product recommending system which utilizes the bar codes of the products has been disclosed in PCT WO 97/46960(dated Dec. 11, 1997). In this system, the sets of information such as ingredients of the products, their characteristics, their origins and the like are inputted and stored in the central data base. Meanwhile, the members of the product information server of the super market inputs the data such as health state, the obesity, the pathological history, the current illness, the taste and the like. If a customer selects a commodity, and if its bar code is transmitted to the central information server, then the desirability of the commodity in view of the inputted health status of the customer is notified to the customer. This is a kind of health service by the super market to the customers.
This product recommending system properly recommends the commodities to the customers in accordance with the health status of the customers, thereby providing an assistance to keeping the customers"" health.
Thus so far, the product evaluation has been focused on the price and quality, but the production background has been utterly excluded from the evaluation.
However, one of the serious problems which are imminently coming to the mankind is the environmental pollution and contamination, and this is closely related to the industrial progress.
The commodities which are exhibited at department stores and super markets are put to the competitive relations. Under this condition, the products which have not been maleficent to the environment during the productions must be different in their profits from the products which have been maleficent to the environment during the productions.
Accordingly, in the purely economical view, the producers who have not invested in the environmental protection projects are much advantageous compared with the producers who have very much invested in the environmental protection projects.
If consumers buy the commodities without considering the above described circumstance, then the producers who have not invested in the environmental protection projects will occupy always the superior position over the producers who have very much invested in the environmental protection projects, because the former are always ensured of higher profits. If this situation continues, the environmental problem will be more and more aggravated. The resultant adverse effects are entirely inflicted on the whole mankind, and therefore, this environmental problem has to be redressed at the present time.
In an effort to solve this problem, the present inventor filed Korean Patent Application No. 2000-12346. In this technique, there is disclosed an environmental contamination preventing system based on direct transactions of agricultural products, livestock products, marine products, and forestry products. In this system, there are stored various kinds of data such as agricultural chemicals, fertilizers, vinyl sheets, drugs, fodder, soil, water quality, air, time of use of other chemicals, their use amounts, their ingredients, their influence to the environment and the like. Thus the consumers can download the information of the production background for a certain commodity through a PC and the internet. In this system, however, the consumers cannot obtain the information on the production backgrounds of commodities instantly at a department store or a super market, but the information can be obtained by going to a place where a PC is installed.
The present invention is intended to overcome the above described disadvantages of the conventional techniques.
Therefore it is an object of the present invention to provide a method for discriminating the production background of a product by a bar code system, in which an environmental protection and safety code (ES code) is marked for consumers together with a bar code for the producer or distributor, so that the consumer can connect to an ES code information server through a mobile phone or a PC, and the consumer can instantly discriminate the production background of the selected commodity.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a method for discriminating the production background of a product by a bar code system, in which the consumer can discriminate the production background of the product to confirm as to its environmentphilic feature, so that if the product is an environment-contaminating one, the product can be repudiated, and if the product is an environmentphilic one, then the procurement can be encouraged, thereby making it possible to prevent the environmental contamination and to promote the product safety.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a method for discriminating the production background of a product by a bar code system, in which the conditions for the product procurement is shifted from the quality and the price to the production background, so that the producers of the environmentphilic products can improve their profits.
In the present invention, the ES information server collects various kinds of information from various information sources to store in its data base the production background such as soil, water quality, air pollution degree, analysis information, factory noise, foul odor, generation of dusts, exhaustion gas, release of waste water, management of waste materials, ecological evaluation, and other analysis data.
Further, there are formed an ES code for the items such as product origin, district, commodity classification, gene modification, result of safety check, management of environmental contamination, production environment, production background of raw materials, production time, check digit, product shipping serial number and the like. Further, there is formed an internet domain address bar code for the internet domains which holds the above ES code information. Thus the ES code, the internet domain address bar code and an ID bar code are put side by side on each product as shown in FIG. 1.